Alexander Kartveli

Kartveli at work (Aviaiton Media LLC)

Alexander Kartveli, born Alexander Kartvelishvili (September 9, 1896 - June 20, 1974), was an influential aircraft engineer, a pioneer in American aviation history and an early technology innovator. Kartveli achieved important breakthroughs in military aviation and design. He is considered to be one of the most important aircraft designers in US history and the world, yet regrettably Kartveli is unknown to most Americans and Georgians.

Kartveli's personal journey parallels a professional career made up of persistent design contributions whose impact and timing take on a magical quality - and whose contribution velocity increased with the challenges of his era. He ventured out of his native Georgia fleeing the Bolsheviks. Leaving behind other family members, Kartveli, along with his mother, escaped turmoil and oppression to pursue a boyhood dream to design aircraft in the nascent field of aviation - an industry that resembled the freewheeling days of the early Internet. While in aviation school in Paris, one of Kartveli's plane designs set a world speed record. Kartkeli earned a reputation in the Paris aviation scene in the 1920's - and eventually met US aviation entrepreneur, Charles Levine. Soon thereafter, Kartveli came to the United States as a penniless immigrant as head of engineering and design at Levine's venture-financed aircraft manufacturing company.